what's the deal with TV and young children?

[COgirl19]

We have recently cut the cable and removed the TV from our home. DD was only watching an hour in the morning but the effects were obvious:

1. Despite the fact that the rest of her day was filled with playing and activities, whatever she saw on TV was ALL she would talk about. You could not talk to her and have the conversation NOT turn to whatever episode of Dora or whatever she watched.

2. Inability to entertain herself. If the TV wasn't on, she demanded constant attention. Fairly normal for a 3 year old I guess but the more we kept the TV off the more content to play by herself she became.

It's mainly #1 that really concerned me a lot. Even though she watched way way way less than most kids it seemed to take over her brain. Is this a normal effect of TV on children? She is otherwise a very smart, active and outgoing girl. I was just shocked at it's effect on her and am wondering if other parents have noticed this and if it is a typical/documented thing.

[NellieKatz]

Here is a helpful link to have, in general:
http://www.commercialfreechildhood.org/

And here is one that talks about TV's effects on the developing young child:
http://www.media-awareness.ca/englis...mpact_kids.cfm

That last one I just got by Googling. It's fairly commonsense in any case. Companies pour exorbitant amounts of money into creating kids' TV and kids' products and kids' advertising.....and most of the time, your child's development is the last thing on their mind when they do so. Think about it...a strong and creative little child who doesn't need much to entertain her may be carefree and happy and developing strong interpersonal skills & all the rest....but that does not help their bottom line.

TV is very passive. Even when the content is "good" it is still very passive. It requires little from the child at an age when "doing" is how they learn and grow.

OK that's the end of my soapbox speech :-)
[and I write this as my kid sits on the couch asking for just one more stupid Nickelodeon cartoon that his Dad unfortunately introduced him to] [sigh...momma as the bad guy]

[NYCVeg]

Hmmm...I'm not sure that reaction is common, though.

We don't have a dd, and dd was entirely screen-free until she was nearly 3 (she's now nearly 4). We now allow her limited access to TV shows/movies--1 hour or less per day, watched only over the computer (so no commercials), and only very limited, pre-screened content.

This still seems like a lot to me, to be honest, but I haven't noticed the kind of effects you've described. She is still quite easily able to entertain herself, and the 30 minutes of Dora/Winnie the Pooh/muppets/etc. does not seem to influence her thinking for the rest of the day. Occasionally, she'll want to "play" [whatever she just watched] immediately after watching, but this is pretty rare.

But television is like sugar--some people can handle a little with no ill effects, while others get kind of crazy from even a small amount. And even though some people seem to be able to handle a lot, it's definitely not good for them!

[InMediasRes]

Recovering TV addict here. My DS seems to have the same tendency.

Our family is TV free for this reason. My DS doesn't talk about it all day, but it is enough of the day that it bothers me. And I am also bothered by how everything new can get related back to a TV show instead of just being appreciated as a new experience. For instance, instead of learning the species names of fish he sees at the aquarium, he wants to know their "names" (like the fish in Nemo have names).

He was recently sick and I let him watch 1-2 movies/day on the computer so he could rest and I can see the effects already. He doesn't want to play, all he wants to do is watch. When he starts watching every day, he can handle more too, instead of just watching 15 min and then getting involved in something else.

[queenjane]

I havent noticed that. we watch ALOT of tv, dvd's etc. Nick Jr. is on much of the day, as a sort of background noise.

Right now, despite blue's clues being on, one of my toddlers is sitting in the bay window looking outside, while playing with two cans from the pantry....the other one is sitting at the kitchen sink 'washing dishes' and the 8 yr old girl is sitting next to me on the computer, playing some kids game where she is sending imaginary emails to virtual characters, which involves alot of typing/spelling.

My kids have learned SO MUCH from tv, probably much more than i could ever "teach" them at this age. Sometimes they will come up with some phrase, or recognize a certain thing, and i wonder "where the heck did they learn that??" and then i'll see an episode and go "ooohhh thats where they got it"...they learned "chugga chugga CHOO CHOO" from some cartoon, and yet were easily able to transfer that knowledge when looking at a picture book, seeing a train, and saying "choo choo!!"

We love tv.

[CatsCradle]

We haven't really noticed the same thing, OP. DD really didn't watch any shows until she was about three, but she tends to lose interest after a while or she will watch something through and then turn it off herself. I would say that we are of the "limited" television camp, mainly because DH and I grew up on limited television and we don't really watch too much now (maybe the news at night and late night movies. DD doesn't talk about television (she's 3.5 now) but she will point out certain characters if she sees them at the drugstore and what not. Perhaps your DD is interested in the character rather than the show itself. For example, DD learned about certain artists in her pre-school and she talks about them all the time. Or, she talks about the dancers she saw in photos in the windows of a certain dance school near us. I find that DD's world is expanding, and she looks to others as examples now (besides DH and I).

[mary3mama]

I think it is so different for each child/family.

We've gone from being mostly screen-free/completely tv-free for much of the last year to free screen access. We don't have a tv/cable but we have a netflix account and several computers with internet access.

The children can watch whatever they want and play whatever games they like.

I thought they'd over-gorge and never do anything else, but it has proven not the case for us.

My 3yo is actually the first to close the laptop where she's been playing or watching and decide to do something different.

The boys (10 & 6) play lots of roblox and wizard 101 and sometimes watch things on netflix.

But they are all so good at deciding for themselves when they've had enough...really.

There are times, of course, when the 3yo is very chattery about a Dora episode, or Blues Clues, or Elmo or whatever. But that's ok to. Chatting with her about whatever is interesting to her lets me in to her world a little more.

It could be suggested that an obsession with tv/screens or a particular show is brought on by its scarcity.

[SweetPotato]

My dd is 4.5. We live in an area with bitterly cold winters (combined with functional sunsets as early as 4:30-5pm), and we tend to watch a lot more tv during that time of the year. She isn't one of these kids who can have it on in the background either-- if the tv is on, she is glued to it. She's not very picky about programming (and we don't have cable), and so is very happy to stick with PBS kids, or with science-y videos from the library- and she is also generally good about turning it off herself afte rthe agreed-upon show is over. While I feel guilty sometimes when we have a bad day and I let her watch a lot, she definitely does learn some interesting things that she's able to incorporate into her daily life (like now she's been watching "Kids Love Spanish dvds and has really picked up a lot!) Now that it's nice outside and the neighbor kids are out playing, she is completely uninterested in watching tv and would much, much rather be outside playing from sun-up to sundown. One thing that I think really helps us, is that the tv in our house is downstairs in a room that we really don't hang out in during the day-- so it's not in her face at all. We have a split-level and spend most of our daytime hours on the middle level, (kitchen/dining/living rooms). There's a piano and a large picture window in the living room, and dd has her own "desk" with art supplies, etc. up here. She likes to be on the same level of the house as me-- which means that she pokes around up here while I work in the kitchen or at the computer. It also means that our downstairs playroom doesn't get much use, but neither does the fireplace room with the tv-- unless it's winter time in the evenings, and then we're all happy to cozy up together for a little Nova before bed

[NYCVeg]

Originally Posted by mary3mama

It could be suggested that an obsession with tv/screens or a particular show is brought on by its scarcity.

The OP said her dd was watching an hour a day--which is hardly "scarcity."

I think the bottom line is that, as with other things, some people are able to self-regulate and some are not. I've heard the same "scarcity" argument about junk food (i.e., if you restrict it too much, your kids will become obsessed with it and overeat it when they're adults), but I think it's much too simplistic. Too much depends on the individual.

I have a couple of friends who grew up in "hippie" households where processed junk food was pretty much non-existent and food was whole and made from scratch. Their eating habits, as adults, are incredibly healthy--junk food just doesn't taste like "food" to them, so they largely avoid it. My parents, on the other hand, did not place any rules on food. I developed a taste for white flour, junk food, and especially sugar, and it has affected me my whole life. Despite knowing a great deal about nutrition, and making putting good, whole, organic food on the table a priority, I struggle every single day with my desire for sugar. At the same time, I don't think my parents were necessarily "wrong"--my sister, for example, has no sweet tooth at all. We're simply different kids who reacted differently to the same environment.

[Hoopin' Mama]

Ds watches probably an hour a day (sometimes more, I hate to admit) and he doesn't discuss it much once it is off. Occassionally he makes a comment, like he wants to go the kindergarten at the Magic School Bus school. (But really, who wouldn't?)

[MammaG]

OP, until we went cold-turkey TV-free a few months ago, we were pretty restricted, too....we never have had cable and kids were only allowed to watch PBS occasionally and we had some movies and streamed Netflix shows. I have never allowed anything with commercials. BUT I did notice, in it's absence, the kind of behavior you talk about. When it was happening, I didn't think much of it and didn't really notice that TV-related play and talk was cropping up quite a lot.

Now that we've been totally screen-free again for a few months, I see in retrospect that they really did seem to devote a lot of brain-space to the limited TV they watched. Sure DS learned to spell and identify whales watching PBS but it was a passive, spit-back-facts kind of learning. Now that we're TV-free, my kids' play is very imaginative, inventive and they have so much more patience and ability to just BE if you kwim. They rest better, sleep more, they are more polite and less into me/mine/ behavior...more tolerant and empathetic I think.

We LOVE being TV-mostly-free (we have one movie night per week, and they see Mama online at times, so we're not completely screen-free).

I guess there are some kids out there who seem fine watching TV (mine did), but I don't really think you know for real just how it's affecting your family until you also see how you are without it for a while.

ETA; NYCveg, I just wanted to add that I've noticed what you talk about regarding upbringing and lifelong habits. I grew up mostly in Europe and we just didn't ever really watch TV...they had Muppets on in English on Sunday nights and my whole family watched that together. We also ate mostly fresh, whole, homemade food that Mum got each day at the markets. She always grew a veggie garden. DH grew up with canned foods, sweets, soda, processed foods, TONNES of TV. Guess which one of us has a hard time with no TV and no junk food?!

[Norasmomma]

My DD watched quite a bit of TV when I was pg with my son last year, she never just went on and on about what she watched. IDK it sounds like it just a quirk she may have, my nephew was like that as a kid. He always talked about what he saw on tv for him it was just the way he was.

[swd12422]

My son shows very little interest in the TV at 2.5, so I can't speak for him, but I thought I'd share my own experience...

My sister and I are two years apart. We grew up with the same TV rules, and the same schedule. We weren't particularly restricted but we didn't sit and watch all day long either. We mostly sat in front of the TV whle my mom was making dinner, til my dad got home. Then we'd watch a little at night (when we were older) and on weekends, but not all day long on weekends.

I have a hard time turning the TV off. It's only since I've been married that I don't have it on all the time. But even when I was single, I didn't get into many shows, just had it on a lot in the background, and watched a lot of Food Network once I got cable.

My sister, on the other hand, is a total junkie. She watches every reality show known to mankind and talks about the people on them like she knows them. B/c she really puts a lot of time and thought into watching what goes on in those shows. She used to be like that with soap operas and serial dramas like ER.

She was always the one who knew what was on when and held the remote when we watched together b/c she knew what she wanted to watch, and I just didn't care. I guess it comes down to personality differences.

[COgirl19]

Thanks for sharing your experiences everyone.

It may very well be a personality thing. DH and his Dad can NOT self-regulate the TV at all. Once it's on they have a vary hard time pulling away from it, and hid Dad (though a wonderful FIL and grandad) spends huge chunks of his income on big screen TVs, premium cable, pay-per-view ect., it is ALWAYS on at their house. MIL on the other hand can just turn it off and walk away and has little interest in it. I am the same as MIL.

FWIW - we have had a wonderful few days without it and plan to keep it this way at least for awhile. We have a few videos she can watch if she is sick or something though. Mamma-G, your experience was really helpful and kind of validates what I have been seeing lately. I hope to see DD's imagination grow as time goes on. I look forward to reading more of your momma's experiences with this, it's a useful discussion.